Yeah, Cav not really looking like another TdF stage is within his grasp. I hope, for his sake, he avoids any crashes though, because this finish is begging for a collision or two.

Hard right just inside 6 km.Hard left at 4kmVery hard right at 3km.Hard left at 2km.Final turn with 600m to go.(Or so I heard.)

However, none of that will matter much if a Bastille Day break sticks. Which will probably be allowed to happen anyway.

Your plot of the turns sounds about right - but the ones in Amiens all look like nice wide boulevards on Google view. We'll see.

Cav just doesn't seem to be there this year. Don't know if all the crashes have taken their toll, or what. He hasn't aged out yet - wouldn't think it's that. Maybe just too many nasty crashes, and lost a little edge. I like him - always have. Still hoping he can pull some good ones out of the bag.

Last sprint stage until Paris? I can't see sprint teams being overly sentimental.

Yeah, this was obviously a more accurate take on things. I seem to remember in years past that the Bastille break would be given some leeway, but those memories might be a decade old now. And considering that yesterday was mostly a drawn-out "recovery" stage, it wasn't likely that the peloton would go easy two days in a row.

Yup - no leeway for Bastille Day. I don't remember any ever being given, actually. That sounds to me like one of those "this is the way it was" legends when it really never was that way. Of course, the French riders have always given an extra effort to make a showing on Bastille day.

Tweets out that Gaviria and Greipel were DQ'ed for irregular sprinting. Then tweets corrected that to say relegated, not DQ'ed. And relegated seems to be what it is.

Yeah, this was obviously a more accurate take on things. I seem to remember in years past that the Bastille break would be given some leeway, but those memories might be a decade old now. And considering that yesterday was mostly a drawn-out "recovery" stage, it wasn't likely that the peloton would go easy two days in a row.

I actually listened to the TV coverage for much of today while supposedly working, which given the lack of action was really interesting, far more interesting than watching the cycling. What was interesting was listening to Boardman talk about the future of cycling as a means of transport in this country as well as his take on the latest technological developments in racing such as elliptical rings (not a fan).

And finally, to bring me eventually to the point, David Millar talking about how breaks weren't allowed to get beyond 6 minutes anymore if there was a chance it would affect the destination of a jersey. Basically his theory was that the standard of riders is consistently much higher and rather than letting a group of good riders go and battling to bring them back, it's better now to battle to prevent them going in the first place. I guess Bastille day also usually falls in between Alps and Pyrenees so more leeway would be allowed in another year as GC time gaps would reduce the level of threat.

Yeah, basically Dan is in the habit of staying too far back in the peloton, especially near the end of the stage. If you noticed that bit of scientific analysis of peloton drafting I posted not so long ago (http://velorooms.com/index.php?topic=235.0;message=2241845), they found that towards the back the amount of effort is a mere 5% or so of what the effort is on the front. That is a much bigger savings than what I had been told previously. Which makes it obvious why somebody would WANT to stay in the back. Tradeoff is the risk of being behind a crash is greater, and CVV thinks that is bad tactics for a team leader.